drones

William Merideth had just finished grilling dinner for his family when he saw a drone hovering over his land. So he did what he said any Kentuckian might do — he grabbed his Benelli M1 Super 90 shotgun, took aim and unleashed three rounds of birdshot.

On a breezy morning next to a cornfield in rural Weld County, Colo., Jimmy Underhill quickly assembles a black and orange drone with four spinning rotors.

"This one just flies itself," he says. "It's fully autonomous."

Underhill is a drone technician with Agribotix, a Colorado-based drone startup that sees farmers as its most promising market. Today he's training his fellow employees how to work the machine in the field.

Bowling Green Republican Rand Paul says he wants to block the President’s nomination of David Barron for the First Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals because of Barron’s legal memos related to drones. During his time as a U.S. Justice Department lawyer, Barron reportedly authored at least two classified opinions giving the go-ahead to use drones to kill the U.S.-born extremist Anwar al-Awlaki in 2011 in Yemen.

A bill that seeks to define how drones could be used by Kentucky law enforcement groups has yet to get a hearing in the General Assembly.

Under the measure, police would have to secure a warrant before using a drone to gather evidence against an individual.

Kentucky ACLU program director Kate Miller says it’s important to note that House Bill 342 does not ban all uses of drones by law enforcement groups.

“There was recently a train derailment in Louisville. If they wanted to take images of that in order to help out with the cleanup, they would be allowed to use a drone for that," Miller told WKU Public Radio. "But if they think I’m a suspicious character and want to check out what I’m doing, they’re going to need a warrant for that.”

Miller says the bill would continue to allow police to use drones to search for missing persons without getting a warrant.

A Kentucky state representative who has co-sponsored legislation to limit the use of surveillance drones says the bill provides an exemption for the use of drones by businesses, like the ones that Amazon plans to use for the delivery of products.

Brent Yonts says his support of the bipartisan bill hinges upon an exception for business drones.

“There are a lot of business uses for drones," said the Muhlenberg County Democrat. "For example, at certain heights that are low to the ground, they’re used in agriculture purposes to look for bugs in crops, for drought areas that might need to be irrigated and any number of things that are cheap and quick and efficient.”

Yonts says his bill's intent is to make sure drones are not invading Kentuckians’ privacy. The drones Amazon plans to begin using in four to five years are capable of delivering five pound packages to a location within 10 miles of one of its distribution centers.

Kentucky has a number of these centers that are closer to urban areas like Lexington and Louisville.

A letter sent to Kentucky Senator Rand Paul from the FBI says the bureau has used domestic drones for surveillance in ten cases since 2006. The letter came in response to a series of questions Sen. Paul asked the FBI regarding its drone use.

Sen. Paul says he will maintain a hold on the nomination of James Comey to be the next FBI Director. Senators can place holds on Presidential nominations, something that is often done to draw attention to a specific issue.

Paul says the FBI’s answers to his questions about domestic drone use are “insufficient”. The Bowling Green Republican has sent the bureau a follow-up letter with more questions.

Politico reports that in its response to Paul, the FBI says the agency has used domestic drones for surveillance in the U.S. in eight criminal cases and two national security cases since 2006.

Kentucky Senator Rand Paul says he's still waiting for FBI officials to answer questions about how the agency is using drones in the U.S.

Appearing Thursday on the public radio program The Takeaway (broadcast at Noon C.T. on WKU Public Radio), the Bowling Green Republican said he's disturbed by the recent admission by FBI leaders that they are using drones in this country without having privacy guidelines in place.

Paul told host John Hockenberry that he has sent the FBI a series of questions about the agency's use of drones, such as whether or not the FBI obtains search warrants before using the surveillance tactic.

Paul said the revelations about domestic drone use combined with the amount of information being collected by the National Security Agency should concern lawmakers and citizens alike.

U.S. Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky is telling FBI director Robert Mueller that he will object to the nomination of his successor until he gets answers on domestic drone use.

In a letter this week to Director Mueller, Senator Paul turns up the heat for an explanation of how the FBI uses surveillance drones on U.S. soil.

“The American people have a right to know the limits that the federal government operates under when using these drones, and whether further action is needed to protect the rights of innocent Americans," writes Paul.

The letter is a follow-up to a previous letter sent on June 20 that asked for a response by July 1. Senator Paul states in his latest correspondence that until he gets adequate answers to his questions, the Kentucky Republican will object to the nomination of James Comey as the next FBI director and encourage his colleagues to the do the same.

Drone use is a hot-button issue for Paul, who in March, filibustered for 13 hours the nomination of CIA Director John Brennan over the use of domestic drones.

A bill has already been pre-filed for the Kentucky General Assembly's 2014 session—and it deals with the use of drones in the state.

Republican state Rep. Diane St. Onge bill limits how unmanned aircraft can be used. It allows U.S. military personnel to use drones in Kentucky for practice purposes. And it also allows drones to be used by law enforcement agencies if they have a specific warrant to do so.

Under St. Onge's bill, all other drone usage would be banned into Kentucky, including general use by law enforcement and corporations.

The freshman lawmaker from Lakeside Park says she's filing the bill because she's concerned about the threat to civil liberties with frequent drone use.

Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul is filibustering the nomination of John Brennan as the next C.I.A director.

Paul, a Bowling Green Republican, is expressing his displeasure with Brennan's testimony on the issue of the possible use of drones by the U.S. government to attack citizens on American soil.

Paul is also upset with a letter sent to him by U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder. In the letter, Holder said the President had the right to order drone strikes against American citizens in the U.S.

Speaking on the floor of the Senate Wednesday, Paul said "no one person, no one politician should be allowed to judge the guilt, to charge an individual, to judge the guilt of an individual and to execute an individual. It goes against everything that we fundamentally believe in our country."

Original post:

Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul is blasting Attorney General Eric Holder's statement that President Obama could order the use of deadly force against an American inside the United States. The claim came in a letter Holder sent to Kentucky U.S. Sen. Rand Paul that was released Tuesday.